The Mona Lisa is a half-length portrait of a woman painted by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. The Mona Lisa is one of the best known pieces of art work in the world.
The painting is thought to be a portrait of Lisa Gherardini , the wife of Francesco del Giocondo. It is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506, although Leonardo may have continued working on it as late as 1517. It was acquired by King Francis I of France and is now the property of the French Republic and is on permanent display at The Louvre museum in Paris.
The image above is what they think Leonardo da Vinci may have looked like.
The Mona Lisa was put up on display at the Louvre an had been there for five years before it had been stolen. With the painting getting stolen that made it even more popular. At the time they thought that the painting would never be seen again but two years later it was found. The painting was actually stolen by a worker at the museum and he had made and sold copies of the painting. Many years later the Mona Lisa had gone through numerous types of vandalism like someone throwing acid of the painting and throwing a rock at it which damaged it slightly but was able to be restored. After all the vandalism they decided to put up bulletproof glass to shield the painting.
Aside from all the vandalism and being stolen, the Mona Lisa has survived for more than 500 years!! It might be an old painting but there are many details people may not notice just by glancing at it.
There was actually a lot of detail put into the background which people usually do not notice because it is behind the focal point of the picture.
Leonardo also did little things like the placement of her hands, placing her right hand on top of her left was a gesture that she was married instead of putting a wedding ring on her finger. It appears as though Mona Lisa does not have eyebrows, some researchers think that back then it was common for women to pluck off all their eyebrows because they were considered unsightly. Others think that she had visible eyebrows and even eyelashes originally but they may have gradually disappeared from the painting being over cleaned. He gave her a faint smile and used a lot of color contrast with light and dark colors.
The Mona Lisa on display.
The 'Mona Lisa' Just Might Be Part Of History's First 3D Image, Researchers Claim
Leonard da Vinci was the original Renaissance man, dabbling in not just art, but anatomy, geology, botany, cartography, mathematics, literature and much, much more. Not only do we give him credit for masterpieces like "The Last Supper" and "The Vitruvian Man," history praises his work in musical instrument construction, hydraulics, cannon design and early flying machines.
So it wouldn't hurt, we suppose, to credit the man with 3D imagery too.
It's a claim German researchers Claus-Christian Carbon and Vera Hesslinger assert in their study of Leonardo's famous portrait, "Mona Lisa." The pair have been analyzing the well-known version of La Giaconda that hangs at Paris' Louvre, as well as an eerily similar copy known as the "Prado Mona Lisa," housed at the Museo del Prado in Spain, and have concluded that the two artworks -- taken together -- may amount to the first stereoscopic image in the world.
In other words, our first 3D artwork.
^^The link above is a very informative video about the Mona Lisa if you are really interested.
‘Second’ Mona Lisa Deemed Authentic
A Swiss-based art foundation says tests on the Isleworth Mona Lisa support claims that it’s an earlier version of Leonardo da Vinci’s portrait hanging in the Louvre in Paris.
nf_isleworth_mona_lisa_0215
A side-by-side comparison of the Isleworth Mona Lisa (L) and the Louvre’s Mona Lisa in Geneva on Sept. 27, 2012.
New tests appear to have confirmed that the Isleworth Mona Lisa — a painting thought to be an earlier version of Leonardo da Vinci’s famous portrait — is indeed authentic, reports the Guardian.
The tests, including one by a specialist in “sacred geometry” – the geometry used in the planning and constructing of religious structures – and one by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, were carried out after the Geneva unveiling of last September.
According to a carbon-dating test by the Zurich Institute, the canvas of the Isleworth painting dates to somewhere between 1410 and 1455, refuting claims that it was a late 16th century copy, the Huffington Post reported. , which appears to depict a younger version of the same woman in the Mona Lisa hanging in the Louvre in Paris,
Italian geometrist Alfonso Rubino, who has made extended studies of Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, determined that the 15th century Isleworth portrait – named after the London suburb where it was kept by British art connoisseur Hugh Blaker early in the last century – conformed to Da Vinci’s basic line structures, the Guardian said.
According to the Independent, David Feldman, vice-president of the Mona Lisa Foundation, said, “When we add these new findings to the wealth of scientific and physical studies we already had, I believe anyone will find the evidence of a Leonardo attribution overwhelming.”
The Islesworth Mona Lisa appears to depict a younger version of the same woman who appears in the Mona Lisa that hangs in the Louvre Museum in Paris. That painting, which has hung in the Louvre for more than three centuries, is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506. It was long thought to be the only extant version of Da Vinci’s portrait of Lisa Gherardini, also known as Lisa del Giocondo. However, brush-stroke analysis conducted by U.S. physicist John Asmus last September sprouted rumors that the Isleworth and the portrait in the Louvre were painted by the same artist, the Independent reported.
What a Real-Time Copy of the Mona Lisa Reveals About Leonardo.
The most mysterious painting in the history of European art just got a little more mysterious. For centuries, Madrid's Prado Museum has held what was believed to be a mere replica of Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece, the Mona Lisa. But researchers at the museum recently discovered that their copy wasn't just any copy. Thanks to the use of infrared technology, they deduced that the work was not only painted in Leonardo's workshop, by one of his students, but that it was done at the same time as the master was completing the original. Although the copy, which depicts La Gioconda with a narrower face, redder dress and significantly more pronounced eyebrows than the original, has been in the Prado's collection for centuries, no one thought much of it, and it was generally attributed to an unknown Flemish artist. But when the Prado's conservators began to study it in preparation for an upcoming show in Paris, they realized there might be more to the work than previously recognized. Using infrared technology, they detected a lush Tuscan landscape — the same as in Leonardo's original — hiding beneath the coat of black varnish that had been added probably in the 18th century and obscured the original background.
That wasn't all they found. Infrared reflectography can reveal the sketches — called underdrawings — and changes that a painter makes in the course of composing a work. By comparing reflectography images taken of the Mona Lisa in 2004 with the copy (they matched), Prado conservators determined that the replica was painted while Leonardo was himself still at work on the original. "There is textual evidence from contemporary observers that Leonardo had assistants in his workshop making copies," says Miguel Falomir, the Prado's curator of Italian Renaissance art. "This is the first time we've found technical evidence of it as well." The painting is still being cleaned and restored, but the findings were presented two weeks ago at a technical conference for specialists held in conjunction with the blockbuster Leonardo exposition currently on show at the National Gallery in London. The reaction from experts in the field has been unanimously positive. "So far, I haven't heard one discordant voice," says Falomir.
Which isn't to say that the discovery hasn't raised questions, including who painted it and when. "It had to have been a pupil, and someone very close to Leonardo at the time," says Matthew Landrus, art historian at Oxford University and the Rhode Island School of Design. "And no one was closer than Andrea Salai and Francesco Melzi." Still, he points out, that there is no definite evidence of their work. Salai, who some historians believe became Leonardo's lover, entered the workshop in 1490; Melzi, who the Prado believes to be the likelier author, joined around 1506.
But the bigger question is why Leonardo would have had his students replicating his work in the first place. Certainly the practice of making copies was not unique to him; many Renaissance artists had their students attempt to recreate their work. The reason may have been pedagogical, but more likely, says Falomir, it was financial. "When people think about these great geniuses creating, they forget that even these artists had to eat. Selling copies was a way of earning money." Landrus suggests it may have been more than that. After all, the Mona Lisa was still in Leonardo's possession when he died. It was never turned over to Francesco del Giocondo, the man who, according to 16th century biographer Giorgio Vasari, had commissioned the portrait of his wife, Lisa Gherardini, in celebration of the birth of their second son. "It's possible that Leonardo realized, 'Hey, I've got a pretty good painting here,' and had the copy made so he could keep something for himself," says Landrus. "Only later did he recognize that he didn't have to give the original away."
But Alison Wright, a specialist in Italian art at University College London who attended the meeting where the Prado discovery was presented, sees the copying as contemporary recognition of Leonardo's importance. "It's just conceivable that there was a copy made to sell, but it's an odd painting, and a commissioned portrait, so it's hard to imagine what the market would be," she says. "It's more likely that it was a matter of Leonardo's students recording his every movement, even while they were still falling from his brush." The discovery is already causing art historians to re-examine their understanding of how Leonardo's studio functioned, and to revise the picture they have of how the most famous painting in Western art captured a singular moment between sitter and artist. "Once again," says Wright, "we see that technical analysis can shed light on a case we thought was shut." But if the Prado copy raises new mysteries, it also clarifies some things. The newly restored copy, with its gleaming landscape in the background and sharp lines defining the spindle of the chair and the ruffle of the bodice, fills in details obscured by the yellowing varnish on the realMona Lisa. "The original hasn't been restored in a long time," says Prado curator Falomir. "The copy invites you to see it with new eyes."
The Mona Lisa is a half-length portrait of a woman painted by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. The Mona Lisa is one of the best known pieces of art work in the world.
The painting is thought to be a portrait of Lisa Gherardini , the wife of Francesco del Giocondo. It is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506, although Leonardo may have continued working on it as late as 1517. It was acquired by King Francis I of France and is now the property of the French Republic and is on permanent display at The Louvre museum in Paris.
The image above is what they think Leonardo da Vinci may have looked like.
The Mona Lisa was put up on display at the Louvre an had been there for five years before it had been stolen. With the painting getting stolen that made it even more popular. At the time they thought that the painting would never be seen again but two years later it was found. The painting was actually stolen by a worker at the museum and he had made and sold copies of the painting. Many years later the Mona Lisa had gone through numerous types of vandalism like someone throwing acid of the painting and throwing a rock at it which damaged it slightly but was able to be restored. After all the vandalism they decided to put up bulletproof glass to shield the painting.
Aside from all the vandalism and being stolen, the Mona Lisa has survived for more than 500 years!! It might be an old painting but there are many details people may not notice just by glancing at it.
There was actually a lot of detail put into the background which people usually do not notice because it is behind the focal point of the picture.Leonardo also did little things like the placement of her hands, placing her right hand on top of her left was a gesture that she was married instead of putting a wedding ring on her finger. It appears as though Mona Lisa does not have eyebrows, some researchers think that back then it was common for women to pluck off all their eyebrows because they were considered unsightly. Others think that she had visible eyebrows and even eyelashes originally but they may have gradually disappeared from the painting being over cleaned. He gave her a faint smile and used a lot of color contrast with light and dark colors.
The Mona Lisa on display.
The 'Mona Lisa' Just Might Be Part Of History's First 3D Image, Researchers Claim
The Huffington Post | by Katherine BrooksPrint Article
Leonard da Vinci was the original Renaissance man, dabbling in not just art, but anatomy, geology, botany, cartography, mathematics, literature and much, much more. Not only do we give him credit for masterpieces like "The Last Supper" and "The Vitruvian Man," history praises his work in musical instrument construction, hydraulics, cannon design and early flying machines.
So it wouldn't hurt, we suppose, to credit the man with 3D imagery too.
It's a claim German researchers Claus-Christian Carbon and Vera Hesslinger assert in their study of Leonardo's famous portrait, "Mona Lisa." The pair have been analyzing the well-known version of La Giaconda that hangs at Paris' Louvre, as well as an eerily similar copy known as the "Prado Mona Lisa," housed at the Museo del Prado in Spain, and have concluded that the two artworks -- taken together -- may amount to the first stereoscopic image in the world.
In other words, our first 3D artwork.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/03/mona-lisa-3d_n_5256193.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISowhGz5wnk
^^The link above is a very informative video about the Mona Lisa if you are really interested.
‘Second’ Mona Lisa Deemed Authentic
A Swiss-based art foundation says tests on the Isleworth Mona Lisa support claims that it’s an earlier version of Leonardo da Vinci’s portrait hanging in the Louvre in Paris.A side-by-side comparison of the Isleworth Mona Lisa (L) and the Louvre’s Mona Lisa in Geneva on Sept. 27, 2012.
New tests appear to have confirmed that the Isleworth Mona Lisa — a painting thought to be an earlier version of Leonardo da Vinci’s famous portrait — is indeed authentic, reports the Guardian.
The tests, including one by a specialist in “sacred geometry” – the geometry used in the planning and constructing of religious structures – and one by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, were carried out after the Geneva unveiling of last September.
According to a carbon-dating test by the Zurich Institute, the canvas of the Isleworth painting dates to somewhere between 1410 and 1455, refuting claims that it was a late 16th century copy, the Huffington Post reported. , which appears to depict a younger version of the same woman in the Mona Lisa hanging in the Louvre in Paris,
Italian geometrist Alfonso Rubino, who has made extended studies of Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man, determined that the 15th century Isleworth portrait – named after the London suburb where it was kept by British art connoisseur Hugh Blaker early in the last century – conformed to Da Vinci’s basic line structures, the Guardian said.
According to the Independent, David Feldman, vice-president of the Mona Lisa Foundation, said, “When we add these new findings to the wealth of scientific and physical studies we already had, I believe anyone will find the evidence of a Leonardo attribution overwhelming.”
The Islesworth Mona Lisa appears to depict a younger version of the same woman who appears in the Mona Lisa that hangs in the Louvre Museum in Paris. That painting, which has hung in the Louvre for more than three centuries, is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506. It was long thought to be the only extant version of Da Vinci’s portrait of Lisa Gherardini, also known as Lisa del Giocondo. However, brush-stroke analysis conducted by U.S. physicist John Asmus last September sprouted rumors that the Isleworth and the portrait in the Louvre were painted by the same artist, the Independent reported.
---http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/02/18/second-mona-lisa-deemed-authentic/
What a Real-Time Copy of the Mona Lisa Reveals About Leonardo.
The most mysterious painting in the history of European art just got a little more mysterious. For centuries, Madrid's Prado Museum has held what was believed to be a mere replica of Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece, the Mona Lisa. But researchers at the museum recently discovered that their copy wasn't just any copy. Thanks to the use of infrared technology, they deduced that the work was not only painted in Leonardo's workshop, by one of his students, but that it was done at the same time as the master was completing the original.Although the copy, which depicts La Gioconda with a narrower face, redder dress and significantly more pronounced eyebrows than the original, has been in the Prado's collection for centuries, no one thought much of it, and it was generally attributed to an unknown Flemish artist. But when the Prado's conservators began to study it in preparation for an upcoming show in Paris, they realized there might be more to the work than previously recognized. Using infrared technology, they detected a lush Tuscan landscape — the same as in Leonardo's original — hiding beneath the coat of black varnish that had been added probably in the 18th century and obscured the original background.
That wasn't all they found. Infrared reflectography can reveal the sketches — called underdrawings — and changes that a painter makes in the course of composing a work. By comparing reflectography images taken of the Mona Lisa in 2004 with the copy (they matched), Prado conservators determined that the replica was painted while Leonardo was himself still at work on the original. "There is textual evidence from contemporary observers that Leonardo had assistants in his workshop making copies," says Miguel Falomir, the Prado's curator of Italian Renaissance art. "This is the first time we've found technical evidence of it as well."
The painting is still being cleaned and restored, but the findings were presented two weeks ago at a technical conference for specialists held in conjunction with the blockbuster Leonardo exposition currently on show at the National Gallery in London. The reaction from experts in the field has been unanimously positive. "So far, I haven't heard one discordant voice," says Falomir.
Which isn't to say that the discovery hasn't raised questions, including who painted it and when. "It had to have been a pupil, and someone very close to Leonardo at the time," says Matthew Landrus, art historian at Oxford University and the Rhode Island School of Design. "And no one was closer than Andrea Salai and Francesco Melzi." Still, he points out, that there is no definite evidence of their work. Salai, who some historians believe became Leonardo's lover, entered the workshop in 1490; Melzi, who the Prado believes to be the likelier author, joined around 1506.
But the bigger question is why Leonardo would have had his students replicating his work in the first place. Certainly the practice of making copies was not unique to him; many Renaissance artists had their students attempt to recreate their work. The reason may have been pedagogical, but more likely, says Falomir, it was financial. "When people think about these great geniuses creating, they forget that even these artists had to eat. Selling copies was a way of earning money."
Landrus suggests it may have been more than that. After all, the Mona Lisa was still in Leonardo's possession when he died. It was never turned over to Francesco del Giocondo, the man who, according to 16th century biographer Giorgio Vasari, had commissioned the portrait of his wife, Lisa Gherardini, in celebration of the birth of their second son. "It's possible that Leonardo realized, 'Hey, I've got a pretty good painting here,' and had the copy made so he could keep something for himself," says Landrus. "Only later did he recognize that he didn't have to give the original away."
But Alison Wright, a specialist in Italian art at University College London who attended the meeting where the Prado discovery was presented, sees the copying as contemporary recognition of Leonardo's importance. "It's just conceivable that there was a copy made to sell, but it's an odd painting, and a commissioned portrait, so it's hard to imagine what the market would be," she says. "It's more likely that it was a matter of Leonardo's students recording his every movement, even while they were still falling from his brush."
The discovery is already causing art historians to re-examine their understanding of how Leonardo's studio functioned, and to revise the picture they have of how the most famous painting in Western art captured a singular moment between sitter and artist. "Once again," says Wright, "we see that technical analysis can shed light on a case we thought was shut."
But if the Prado copy raises new mysteries, it also clarifies some things. The newly restored copy, with its gleaming landscape in the background and sharp lines defining the spindle of the chair and the ruffle of the bodice, fills in details obscured by the yellowing varnish on the realMona Lisa. "The original hasn't been restored in a long time," says Prado curator Falomir. "The copy invites you to see it with new eyes."
--http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2105928,00.html